Invasive Species

During the past century, nonindigenous plants, animals, and pathogens have been introduced at increasing rates into all US ecosystems. A growing number of these species are becoming invasive, and contribute to declines in native species, changes in ecosystem function, and cumulative economic impacts currently estimated at more than $137 billion annually.

An "invasive species" is defined as a nonnative species whose introduction causes or is likely to cause harm to the economy, environment, or human health. The cost of infestations of leafy spurge alone to agricultural producers and taxpayers is $144 million/year in the Dakotas, Montana, and Wyoming. Aggressive invasive fishes in the Great Lakes threaten a commercial fishery valued at $4.5 billion which supports 81,000 jobs. Invasive Norway rats cause up to $19 billion/year in environmental and economic damage. Nonnative livestock diseases cost $9 billion/year. In the coming decades, increasing human travel and trade and changing types and patterns of environmental disturbance are expected to exacerbate these impacts. Because of its high diversity of environmental conditions and habitats, the US is particularly vulnerable to invasions.

The Federal Government has begun to mount an organized effort to address the invasive species threat, coalescing around Executive Order 13112 (1999). There is now a National Invasive Species Council, which has issued a draft Management Plan, and has assembled several technical working groups. The National Biological Information Infrastructure has several regional programs developing invasive species information systems as their highest priority initiative, and plans to establish a national node for invasive species in 2002. These efforts are coordinated with international initiatives under the United Nations (the Global Invasives Species Programme, GISP), NAFTA (the North American Biodiversity Information Network, NABIN), the Summit of the Americas the InterAmerican Biodiversity Information Network, IABIN), and a number of bilateral agreements, to develop international exchange on invasive species information. Globalization has greatly increased the international movements of harmful species through travel and agricultural, horticultural, and pet industries, and has become a principal impediment to international trade agreements.

All of these efforts recognize the central role of NASA's spacebased sensors and advanced computational, modeling, and information technologies in addressing invasive species science and policy on a national and global scale. Both the potential for movements of invasive species, and the susceptibility of sensitive habitats to new invaders are known to be strongly influenced by climate warming, changes in rainfall, soil moisture, and runoff, and are increasingly driven by extreme events. As a result, a wide range of existing and emerging NASA Earth Science Enterprise technologies will be central to a better understanding of invasive species risks. At the same time, many invasive species greatly alter the water relations, carbon storage, fire cycle, and reflectance properties of landscapes, and may be an important feedback link to climate.

References

National Invasive Species Council. 2001. Meeting the Invasive Species Challenge: The National Invasive Species Management Plan. 80 pp.

Office of Science and Technology Policy, Committee on Environment and Natural Resources, Subcommittee on Ecological Systems. 2001. Ecological Forecasting: Agenda for the Future, Office of Science and Technology Policy, Washington, DC, 8 pp.

Pimentel, D., Lach, L., Zunia, R., & Morison, D. 1999. Environmental and Economic Costs Associated with NonIndigenous Species in the United States.